Author: Pastor J.O. Lawal

“Then she called to her husband, and said, “Please send me one of the young men and one of the donkeys, that I may run to the man of God and come back.” So he said, “Why are you going to him today? It is neither the New Moon nor the Sabbath.” And she said, “It is well.”” (2 Kings 4:22-23NKJV)

What was the exact reason the Shunammite woman was visiting Elisha on the occasion mentioned in our opening bible text? It was that her son was dead. And how was that Elisha’s problem? Was he the one that killed the boy? No, he was not the one that killed the boy. But he was the one that prophesied that the woman and her husband would have him, having been childless for years. And his prophecy at the time did not suggest that the boy would not live long at all. So, it made sense for the woman to want to meet him to find out what went wrong or missing.

But then, as we also see in our opening text, this woman would not tell her husband her real reason for wanting to meet Elisha. She would not tell him that their boy, their only child, had died from his brief illness. Why?

First, the reason was that she wanted to protect the man. And how was she protecting him by not telling him right away that their son was gone? Well, as the account goes, this woman’s husband was already an old man when the prophecy came that they would have a child. Evidently, he had become even older when the body suddenly took ill and died. So, to bring him news of the death of his boy, his only child, at that age may be as good as handing him a death sentence. Or what do you think?

Now remember that though Jacob had twelve sons, when he learnt of the death of Joseph, he became an unhappy and depressed old man. And he would have died in depression, if he had not been blessed by God to see Joseph again. Also, remember that even though David did not touch Nabal’s family at all, the man still had a heart attack just by hearing what David and his men could have done to him and his family. So, it is not everyone that has a strong heart to handle bad news and not be destroyed by it. (Cf. Gen 37 & 1Sam 25)

At any rate, my point is that it was because the Shunammite woman cared about her husband and wanted to protect him from the shock of their boy’s death that she did not immediately inform him of what had happened. She most likely did not know how exactly the old man would respond to the news. And she was not willing to risk anything. So, she just told him that all was well. And all eventually ended well.

But what if all had not ended well? What would she have done? Well, even if all had not ended well, it would still have been clear to everyone around that she did her best to protect her old husband from being destroyed by the news of the death of their only child.

More so, this woman had no intention of giving her son up to death like that. Instead, she was going to meet the man of God that gave them the prophecy about the birth of the boy to do something about the situation. But would she have been able to do that, if she had told her husband what happened and the man had fainted or died? Would that not have been another problem on its own, a problem that may have made meeting the man of God to bring their boy back to life impossible or difficult for her? It would!

Then let us even say that her husband took the bad news in good faith. Did the woman have any guarantee that he would be on the same faith page with her in meeting the man of God to bring the boy back to life? No, she did not! And if the man should be unbelieving in the situation, would he have helped the matter at all? No!

So, that woman was not just after protecting her husband from grief, she was also after protecting her own faith from being paralysed or made ineffective by anyone’s unbelief. And we should learn from her.
What should we learn from her? First, we should learn to protect our loved ones from information or news that may ruin them.

See, because of the conditions of some people, it may not be appropriate or good to expose them to certain news or information. Otherwise, things may worsen for them. So, if we truly love them, we will do our best to keep them from seeing or hearing anything that may make a bad situation worse for them.

However, we should also know that there are times that keeping certain information away from some people is nothing but making a bad situation worse for them and perhaps for us too. So, before we decide to keep any vital information away from those who deserve to have it, we should be sure that our doing so is not going to worsen things for them or us.

The second lesson from that woman is the need for us to protect our faith from any form of unbelief. We must not assume that all those who love us and are good to us are people of faith. That is because some, many or all of them may not be people of faith at all. And where are not sure of this, it will be wisdom for us to make the exercise of our faith private. Otherwise, the unbelief of even the good or righteous people in our lives may make our faith weak or ineffective in enjoying God’s provision of favour, restoration or protection.

Copyright © 2025, Reality Desk, a ministry of Alaythia Bible Church –This material is the sole property of Reality Desk. It may be copied for personal non-commercial use only in its entirety free of charge. All copies must contain this copyright notice. Please direct any questions you may have to pastor@abcministryng.com or call: 08037592851 (WhatsApp Number: 08146472876)

“When I was a boy in my father’s house, still tender, and an only child of my mother, he taught me and said, “Lay hold of my words with all your heart; keep my commands and you will live. Get wisdom, get understanding; do not forget my words or swerve from them. Do not forsake wisdom, and she will protect you; love her, and she will watch over you. Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding.” (Prov 4:3-7NIV)

Those are Solomon’s words to us. And he says them to let us know that greatness did not just happen to him; he prepared himself for it. How? It was by taking very seriously the teaching and discipline of his father, David.

As he shows us in that text, when he was but a boy, his father used to teach him all kinds of things. And among the things he taught him was the need for him to go for wisdom and understanding with everything he had. Why? Wisdom and understanding are supreme; they are more important than anything else a man could own or inherit. And the one who has them will be honoured and exalted by them.

You can, then, see why it was wisdom and understanding that he asked for, when God came to him in a dream and asked him to tell Him what he wanted Him to do for him. He had so meditated on these things that even in a dream he had to talk about them to God. And the reason he gave himself to meditating on them that way was that he took what his father had told him about them very seriously. That means he agreed with his father that by going for wisdom and understanding he would be preparing himself for greatness in life. (Cf. 1Kings 3)

The point I making, at any rate, is that Solomon’s focus, as a young man, was not merely on taking the throne of his father; rather, it was on making himself fit to be approved by God, his father and the people as the next king over the nation of Israel. And did he get their approval or not? He did. First, he was his father’s choice for the throne. Second, and more importantly, he was God’s choice for the throne. Then, when he ascended the throne and began to lead the people with wisdom and justice, it did not take them much time at all to accept him as worthy of the throne of his father, David.

But think about his elder brothers that were after getting the throne for themselves. Did any of them succeed? No! Why? None of them was prepared for true leadership. None of them had the fear of God, the wisdom and the discipline required to sit on that throne. And why did they lack these things? The reason was that they did not yield themselves to learn from their father, David.

Amnon, for instance, was a rapist. And he was so lacking in self-control that he even raped his own sister, Tamar. Therefore, even though as the firstborn he should have naturally been the crown prince, he lost his life before his time. He was caught by surprise and assassinated. And that was also possible because of his lack of self-control in handling wine. He, as the first heir to the throne of David, was supposed to be on his guard always. But he was not on his guard on the day he was brutally killed while getting himself drunk. That, of course, shows that he did not learn much, if he learnt anything at all, from his father about leadership and soldiery. (Cf. 2Sam 13)

What about Absalom? He was murderous, crooked and immoral. Instead of learning from his father and gaining the discipline needed to lead as king, he was busy using his fine face and smooth lips to plot how he would take over the kingdom from him by force. And did he succeed? Yes, it initially looked like he was going to succeed. But it only took a while for his father’s men to snatch the kingdom from his hand again and get rid of him. How, then, could someone like that keep the nation safe, if he were to be king? (Cf. 2Sam 16-18)

Then we have Adonijah, who also put himself forward and said, “I will be king.” What made him think he was fit to be king? Well, the reason was that he had some entitlement mentality. As we are shown in the bible, his father never rebuked or corrected him about anything. So, he was an overpampered child. And he felt that he could take anything he wanted for himself, including the kingdom of his father. But was he trained, disciplined and raised to be king by his father? No! And was he allowed to become king? No! Instead, he was rejected.

It is actually both interesting and surprising that the same David that raised Solmon and brought him up well would not discipline Adonijah at all. Why? We are not told the reason in the bible. Perhaps someone was getting in his way whenever he wanted to discipline him early in his life. We would not know. But we do know that by not raising the way he raised Solomon, he was showing that he had no intention of putting him in any position of greatness or significance in his kingdom. And since he too did nothing about gaining whatever discipline and training his father would not give him from the word of God, God also would not consider or choose him to be His king over Israel, though he was very handsome. What a waste of beauty! (Cf. 1Kings 1)

Well, my point all long is that greatness will not just happen to you because you live with it or very close to it. You will have to prepare yourself for it, if it will be yours. So, you need to focus more on gaining the discipline and wisdom you need for greatness in life than on greatness itself. That means as you find opportunities to learn and be trained to increase in fruitfulness and usefulness in life, make the most of them. Don’t excuse yourself from the word of God. Don’t reject discipline. Don’t run away from training. Otherwise, true greatness will always run away from you, even if you come as close to it as the air you breathe in.

Copyright © 2025, Reality Desk, a ministry of Alaythia Bible Church –This material is the sole property of Reality Desk. It may be copied for personal non-commercial use only in its entirety free of charge. All copies must contain this copyright notice. Please direct any questions you may have to pastor@abcministryng.com or call: 08037592851 (WhatsApp Number: 08146472876)